jrawlings
Recruit

Change the skills such that a player can use any weapon in the game, regardless of skill. However, they incur a penalty if the appropriate skill isn't high enough. My reasoning is that anyone can attempt to use a weapon... I've never tried to swing a two handed great sword (or any in real life) but who's to say I can't give it the ol' college try? The basic concept of swinging a weapon or shooting a bow or throwing a stick isn't rocket science, any character should be able to attempt it, albeit without much luck.
Here are examples of how this could be implemented:
Power strike: Instead of making weapons restricted by strength allow anyone to use any weapon. However, if the powestrike skill isn't high enough, they incur a swing speed penalty. For example, let's say weapon X currently requires a strength of 10 to use. Let anyone use that weapon, but they will incur a 10% decrease in swing speed for each point of power strike below 3.
Power throw: Again, anyone can use any weapon. Each weapon has a power throw requirement to use without penalty. So, let's say javelin X requires a power throw of 3. If you have power throw of 3, there would be no change from what you see now. BUT, if power throw is less than 3, the reticule gets bigger, like what you'd see with horse archery. Another way to do this would be to decrease max range.
Power draw: Same as power throw. If you want to wield a war bow, you can, but if your power draw is less than 4, the reticule will be bigger. Another way to penalize would be to decrease max range.
The reticule penalty would be additive with the horse archery penalty if someone is trying to throw/use bow on horseback. So someone with a horse archery of 0 and a power draw of 0 using a warbow on a coarser wouldn't be able to hit the broadside of a barn while at a full gallop.
Of course, each weapon would still need to have on its description the skills required to use without penalty... so that war bow would have a notation of "power draw of 4 required for use without penalty" or something like that.
Here are examples of how this could be implemented:
Power strike: Instead of making weapons restricted by strength allow anyone to use any weapon. However, if the powestrike skill isn't high enough, they incur a swing speed penalty. For example, let's say weapon X currently requires a strength of 10 to use. Let anyone use that weapon, but they will incur a 10% decrease in swing speed for each point of power strike below 3.
Power throw: Again, anyone can use any weapon. Each weapon has a power throw requirement to use without penalty. So, let's say javelin X requires a power throw of 3. If you have power throw of 3, there would be no change from what you see now. BUT, if power throw is less than 3, the reticule gets bigger, like what you'd see with horse archery. Another way to do this would be to decrease max range.
Power draw: Same as power throw. If you want to wield a war bow, you can, but if your power draw is less than 4, the reticule will be bigger. Another way to penalize would be to decrease max range.
The reticule penalty would be additive with the horse archery penalty if someone is trying to throw/use bow on horseback. So someone with a horse archery of 0 and a power draw of 0 using a warbow on a coarser wouldn't be able to hit the broadside of a barn while at a full gallop.
Of course, each weapon would still need to have on its description the skills required to use without penalty... so that war bow would have a notation of "power draw of 4 required for use without penalty" or something like that.